Will You Be My Bridesmaid?

After they agreed, I put their faces on a couple of the ugliest dresses I could find, and sent them the pictures. Good for a laugh!

Brandon proposed while we were in Mexico. Before we boarded the plane back home, we knew who would be in our bridal party.

We knew it would be small. You simply cannot expect everyone to come to a destination wedding, and friends and extended family is no exception. Heck, even immediate family may not show up. So we did not want to ask anyone who may not be able to come, and then feel obligated. Plus, as I previously mentioned, we are not “big group” people. We opted to keep it small. Brandon has a best friend, who was an obvious choice for best man. I have one sister, who I also happen to adore. So she was the obvious choice for maid of honour. But, there was a problem. My sister will only be 17 when I say my “I Do’s”. She has never been involved in a wedding, and she is graduating from high school just weeks before I walk down the sandy aisle. Luckily, I have a fabulous friend who I also adore, who happens to be an excellent planner, who I knew would help my sister out with anything that may be needed or wanted. Plus, I was a bridesmaid for this friend a couple years ago, and she loves weddings. Why she is not an event planner is beyond me. So I decided on one bridesmaid and one maid of honour. Yes, I know the “sides” of the bridal party are uneven. It does not bother us. Certain traditions kind of fly out the window when doing a destination wedding.

So, asking the girls. As I mentioned before, I am crafty. I could not just call them and ask them. So I scoured the Internet (again) and found some pictures of some great ideas on creative ways to ask them to be a part of my special day. (Thank you, pinterest!) I saw pictures of brides baking cookies in the shape of dresses with a card to ask their girls. Apparently there is a wine called “Bridesmaid” that one bride talked about having delivered. Another bride made picture frames that said “bridesmaid” and put a picture of the two of them together in it. Yet another created a whole photobook for each girl. I did not go “all out” like some, yet I didn’t want to just call them up and ask, either.

So, I found some coconut-scented bath salts at Walmart. I put a package in an envelope, and tried to create cards shaped like dresses to go with them. I ended up, afterwards, seeing something similar on etsy, so if you don’t want to make them yourself, you could try there.

I started with blue paper (one of our colours) and a dress shape. I am comfortable with Word, but you could do this in another program just as easily (maybe even easier?).

In Word, I typed each girl’s name in the centre of the dress, then flipped the dress shape so it would be creating a mirror of itself. The mirror line would be the fold (where the shoulders of the dress would be).

Then I printed it on the blue paper and cut out the shape.

Finally I folded along the aforementioned “fold line”.

On the outside I embellished with some scrapbooking stickers (the sequins) I had, and ribbon (I just tied the ribbon around the front part of the dress)

On the inside I pasted a note, asking each girl to be a part of the day, with a little footnote saying, “I promise the dress will not be this poofy”.

I hand delivered the one to my sister. The other one I mailed. Since I had the materials already (but you could definitely find the ribbon and stickers at a dollar store), I only had to pay postage on one, and the price of the coconut-scented bath salts. Again, you might be able to find something even cheaper at a dollar store, but I was happy with the Walmart ones. So, all in all, a very inexpensive project, and moreover, the girls loved them.

As for Brandon, I think he asked his best man while chatting online one day. Ah, men.

Did you ask your bridal party to be involved in a creative way?

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About Krysta

Krysta is a 28-year-old teacher living in Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada. When she is not planning or marking essays and poetry, she loves reading, watching tv and movies, crafting, hanging out with her pets, and of course, her fiancé. She is planning a destination wedding for July 18, 2013 in the beautiful Dominican Republic.